Many know that COVID-19 has been spreading and killing African Americans globally, but on April 9, 2020 Elvia Díaz revealed the statistics behind it. The video shows USA Today spokesperson Deborah Berry saying that 70% of the people dying in Louisiana from the virus are African American, while only 30% of their population are black. In Illinois, 42% of the 307 people who have died of Coronavirus were black, while 15% of their population are made up of black people. The numbers are so high in these black communities  because they do not have easy access and funds to health care and are at a higher risk of untreated asthma, diabetes, and high blood pressure. These underlying conditions make it easier for COVID-19 to attack because the body is already in bad shape. I shared this article because it shows statistics of other places other than my hometown, New York, where 9,000 people have already died from the Coronavirus. This past Sunday, 758 people died in that one day causing hospitals and nursing homes to run out of bed space.

Slavery was a time period where African Americans were forced to work under inhumane conditions. They were sold to others as if they were objects and beaten when “disrespectful”. Someone who caught my eye in the biography videos was Harriet Tubman. Harriet Tubman helped free hundreds of slaves, including herself. She showed bravery which allowed the other slaves to follow her lead. Due to her bravery, African Americans today can look up to her when in doubt. She had dogs, slave masters, and others watching out for her but was determined to free her people. 

I watched the 2016 version of “Birth of a Nation” when it first came out. It told the story of Nat Turner and his rebellion against slavery. He helped free many people and killed many slave masters. The movie was very powerful because it showed his will to help others. He was beaten and starved for days when disobedient. He was also a preacher for the “church” services held on plantations. Masters forced him to twist the Bible’s words around to preach to slaves as if slavery was the rightful thing to do. After his rebellion Nat was eventually beaten and lynched.

America has many customs, beliefs, and cultural ways. This country has various ways of teaching, cooking, dressing, music, and more, but these things are not the ways of past Americans. In fact, they were taught to white Americans by Africans that unwillingly were bought to America. While Africans were forced to work, Americans noticed many customs they’d like to learn.

Holloway dissects this idea in his book “What Africa had given America”. He educates readers on how Americans were able to develop their homes practicing the ways of Africans, while continuing to enslave them. He first focuses on how Africa had a teaching and cooking system, dressing style and the Americans began to make it their own. Secondly, he explains that the Bantu people are quite skilled mechanically, which depicts that although Africans were taken from what their used to at home, they used what was around them to stick to what they know. Third, most crops that were sold in America were grown by Africans. Fourth, many of the diseases that has traveled to America from other places were able to get treated using African remedies. This shows that Africans genuinely loved their ways from home, because they even used them to help the Americans who enslaved them. Lastly, along with music selection and preference, many African dances made its way to America and turned into America’s own dances. This reading shed a lot of light on topics many people are not ready to discuss. Holloway makes this an interesting way to tell us that overtime as technology improved, so did the customs of Africans, but Americans only played a part in this improvement. Africa’s practices are the root of everything we have today. One question I have is: “Do white Americas who still continue to mistreat Africans and African Americans realize that without us they would not have more than half of the things they use, love, and enjoy today? If so, how come they fail to accept this fact?”

The word diaspora refers to a group of people who has similar culture or heritage. The African Diaspora specifically handles Africa’s culture and heritage and how it has scattered around or across the globe, mainly in America and the Caribbean. Those living outside of Africa focus on the evolution of African cities. During a certain time period the African slave trade was going on, which is where Africans were forcefully removed from Africa and their different ways and customs were exposed to Americans. Due to many Africans living in America, they helped originate everything we have today.